The second day of the European Poker Tour Malta Main Event was played last Tuesday with 512 players contending for the title. Six entrants took advantage of the latest re-entry at the beginning of Day 2, bringing the total field to 895. Massive as it is, this 895-player field actually generates a prize pool of $ 4,340,750. 121 would make the money in this poker tournament, including $ 810,400 for the eventual winner. After six 75-minute levels of play, the field was trimmed to 121 with Sam Chartier on top of the chip count. Armed with 465,500 chips, Chartier is heading to the next phase ahead of Moritz Dietrich (460,000) and Ismail Kalkan (426,900). Sam Chartier bagged up the lead by eliminating the EPT Prague High Roller winner Ivan Soshnikov. Filippo Lazzaretto is fourth in the chip count with 348,100 chips, followed by Nandor Solyom (335,700), Francois Billard (320,000), Koray Aldemir (312,100), Jean Montury (300,000), Sergio Aido (272,500) and Dorin Rauta (264,300).

A panel of renowned poker players made the trip to this event, but most of them failed to qualify for Wednesday battle. Include the likes of Marvin Rettenmaier, Philipp Gruissem, George Danzer, Ole Schemion, Martin Finger, Bertrand "ElkY" Grospellier, Vanessa Selbst, Fabian Quoss, Jorryt van Hoof, Ami Barer, Dzmitry Urbanovich, Dominik Nitsche, Marc-Andre Ladouceur, and Day 1B chip leader Max Silver. As for the World Series of Poker champ Martin Jacobson, Jonathan Duhamel, Jake Cody and Dominik Panka, they remain in the hunt for the title. Set to 5 levels of 90 minutes of play, the game will resume this Wednesday with Day 2s 121 survivors.